Recently, scholars have devoted renewed attention to the role of religion in American life. Thus, it is important that they use the most effective means available to categorize and study religious groups. However, the most widely used classification scheme in survey research (T.W. Smith 1990) does not capture essential differences between American religious traditions and overlooks significant new trends in religious affiliation. We critique this scheme based on its historical, terminological, and taxonomical inaccuracy and offer a new approach that addresses its shortcomings by using denominational affiliation to place respondents into seven categories grounded in the historical development of American religious traditions. Most important, this new scheme yields more meaningful interpretations because the categories refer to concrete religious traditions. Because of increased accuracy in classification, it also improves model fit and reduces measurement error.

/pdf/the-measure-of-american-religion-toward-improving-the-state-3ginl7crzu.pdf

The Measure of American Religion: Toward Improving the State of the Art

This article reviews recent literature on U.S. religious institutions and argues that a new paradigm is emerging in that field, the crux of which is that organized religion thrives in the United States in an open market system, an observation anomalous to the older paradigm's monopoly concept. The article has six sections: first, a brief survey of the paradigm crisis; second, a development of the concept of an open market in the historiography and sociology of U.S. religion; third, fourth, and fifth, arguments that U.S. religious institutions are constitutively pluralistic, structurally adaptable, and empowering; sixth, a consideration of recent religious individualism in the light of the new paradigm. A conclusion sketches some research implications.

Work in Progress Toward a New Paradigm for the Sociological Study of Religion in the United States

Church-based health promotion (CBHP) interventions can reach broad populations and have great potential for reducing health disparities. From a socioecological perspective, churches and other religious organizations can influence members' behaviors at multiple levels of change. Formative research is essential to determine appropriate strategies and messages for diverse groups and denominations. A collaborative partnership approach utilizing principles of community-based participatory research, and involving churches in program design and delivery, is essential for recruitment, participation, and sustainability. For African Americans, health interventions that incorporate spiritual and cultural contextualization have been effective. Evidence indicates that CBHP programs have produced significant impacts on a variety of health behaviors. Key elements of CBHP are described with illustrations from the authors' research projects.

https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/10.1146/annurev.publhealth.28.021406.144016

Church-Based Health Promotion Interventions: Evidence and Lessons Learned

Quantitative and qualitative research suggests that urban disadvantaged environments may be highly stressful to their inhabitants. Social disorganization may be deleterious to both physical and mental health. The relationships among perceptions of one's neighborhood, measures of social support and social integration, and level of subsequent depressive symptoms was examined with a community sample of 818 individuals screened for an HIV prevention intervention, most of whom were current or former drug users. After adjusting for baseline levels of depressive symptoms, perceptions of neighborhood characteristics (vandalism, litter or trash, vacant housing, teenagers hanging out, burglary, drug selling, and robbery) predicted depressive symptoms at a 9-month follow-up interview. Measures of social support and social integration, entered as interactions with neighborhood perceptions, did not buffer the effect of neighborhood perceptions. However, CES-D scores at follow-up for frequent church attendees were lower. The data support theories of social disorganization and social stress and suggest the need for structural intervention.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/1519814.pdf

Stressful neighborhoods and depression: a prospective study of the impact of neighborhood disorder.

This research integrates and elaborates the basic premises of Blumer's group position theory of prejudice. It does so in order to make explicit, more fully integrated, and empirically pliable the theoretical foundations of a sociological analysis of the nature of racial prejudice. In so doing, the research identifies important areas of agreement between Gordon Allport's approach to prejudice and that of Blumer. Blumer neither provided a full synthetic statement of his several major pieces on prejudice nor pursued sustained empirical research in the area. Hence, the present article (1) identifies the core assumptions of the group position model, (2) summarizes a recent line of empirical work examining claims embedded in the group position approach, (3) specifies how this approach differs from other closely related approaches, and (4) identifies major tasks for future theoretical and empirical work.

Prejudice as Group Position: Microfoundations of a Sociological Approach to Racism and Race Relations

Black churches in America have long been recognized as the most independent, stable, and dominant institutions in black communities. In The Black Church in the African American Experience, based on a ten-year study, is the largest nongovernmental study of urban and rural churches ever undertaken and the first major field study on the subject since the 1930s.\n\nDrawing on interviews with more than 1,800 black clergy in both urban and rural settings, combined with a comprehensive historical overview of seven mainline black denominations, C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya present an analysis of the Black Church as it relates to the history of African Americans and to contemporary black culture. In examining both the internal structure of the Church and the reactions of the Church to external, societal changes, the authors provide important insights into the Church’s relationship to politics, economics, women, youth, and music.\n\nAmong other topics, Lincoln and Mamiya discuss the attitude of the clergy toward women pastors, the reaction of the Church to the civil rights movement, the attempts of the Church to involve young people, the impact of the black consciousness movement and Black Liberation Theology and clergy, and trends that will define the Black Church well into the next century.\n\nThis study is complete with a comprehensive bibliography of literature on the black experience in religion. Funding for the ten-year survey was made possible by the Lilly Endowment and the Ford Foundation.

The Black Church in the African American Experience.

Black churches in America have long been recognized as the most independent, stable, and dominant institutions in black communities. In The Black Church in the African American Experience, based on a ten-year study, is the largest nongovernmental study of urban and rural churches ever undertaken and the first major field study on the subject since the 1930s.

Drawing on interviews with more than 1,800 black clergy in both urban and rural settings, combined with a comprehensive historical overview of seven mainline black denominations, C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya present an analysis of the Black Church as it relates to the history of African Americans and to contemporary black culture. In examining both the internal structure of the Church and the reactions of the Church to external, societal changes, the authors provide important insights into the Church’s relationship to politics, economics, women, youth, and music.

Among other topics, Lincoln and Mamiya discuss the attitude of the clergy toward women pastors, the reaction of the Church to the civil rights movement, the attempts of the Church to involve young people, the impact of the black consciousness movement and Black Liberation Theology and clergy, and trends that will define the Black Church well into the next century.

This study is complete with a comprehensive bibliography of literature on the black experience in religion. Funding for the ten-year survey was made possible by the Lilly Endowment and the Ford Foundation.

The Black church in the African-American experience

The Black Muslims in America.

This new edition of Lincoln's classic study details the formation and development of the Black Muslim movement through its wide-ranging expressions in America today, focusing especially on Louis Farrakhan's movement as the true successor to the original Nation of Islam founded by Elijah Muhammad.

C. Eric Lincoln

Papers

The Black Church in the African American Experience.

The Black church in the African-American experience

The Black Muslims in America.

The Black Muslims in America

Race, Religion, and the Continuing American Dilemma